Reflux
by Raven's Wing
Summary: Some things are better unremembered and some things are better left unsaid.[Unusual character, Jack fic]
1. History of Heartbreak

**Disclaimer**: I do not own "Newsies" or any of the genius associated to them. Disney owns them, no infringement intended. I am not making money from this in any way, I claim no rights to the characters mentioned from the movie, but I do claim the plot and the ideas surrounding this story. Don't steal, don't sue, and I'm sure we will all be grand friends.

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**A/N**: This is the first of three chapters of an idea I had. It is different. It is weird. However, I love it – and I hope you will too. This first chapter does deal with sex, though it is not detailed in any sense of the word it does refer to two characters engaging in the act. Even though I have the warning down there – I thought I'd be fair. 

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Warning**: PG-15 (sexuality, profanity, adult situations)

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Chapter 1: **History of Heartbreak

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Originally she had wanted to go into show-business. Acting on the stage had been her desire since she never could see herself working day in and day out inside a dirty, stuffy, hot, dirty factory. She wanted to be a singer, but she never had the gumption it took to get in front of all those people and perform. Her father had been a drunk and her mother an opium addict. It wasn't that she was destined to be a professional prostitute, but somehow with the hollow ambition and troubled childhood it just all fit together. 

She had worked at The Pike for a little over a year. Just long enough to harden her smile but not her heart. Time and too many long nights would see that her heart was sufficiently callused before too much longer, but for now she was still tender enough to care about others. Or maybe it was just that she was still unexperienced enough not to look a man in the eye when she was flat on her back beneath them. After all - she was barely seventeen.

Despite her young age – she had learned a lot while she had worked at The Pike.

She had learned how men loved the way her tightly strung corset made her body curve as much as they loved peeling (or tearing) it away from her body. She had learned how to walk and what the swivel of her hips could do to attract potential customers. She had learned how much rouge was enough for her lips and cheeks as well as how to cover up the dark circles under eyes with rice power. She had learned which herbs to drink to ensure that she wouldn't become with child and how rubbing the charcoal from burned bread on your teeth made them shine whiter. She had learned how to pin her wigs in place tightly so they didn't come off during an encounter and how to moan at just the right times. She had learned how to make men writhe and beg as well as how to grip the sheets and pretend they were giving her bliss. She had learned of the perverted fantasies that even the most mild business man could have and she had learned how to fulfill them. It was true that she had learned many things regarding the act of sex but she had never been able to fully disconnect herself from the men who violated her on a regular basis. She had never learned to not look them in the eyes.

It was a typical night at The Pike. Several of the girls were prowling the bar - moving towards enticing a customer to an upstairs room. A few had already made their way up those stairs and she did not want to know exactly what they were doing even though she did. She knew as well as anyone of all the depravity that happened behind closed door, sometimes out in plain sight, in this establishment. The air hung heavily with the smell of smoke and ale. Those were two things she had become very familiar with in her time at The Pike. The nip of gin and bite of whiskey were both familiar tastes to pass her experienced lips. Alcohol helped to keep her in a more accepting state when it came to the men she called her customers.

She'd had a few drinks herself that night as she perused the bar floor for her next meal ticket. That was all these men were to her. At least that was all they should be to her and she always attempted to convince herself that she was as hard and as cunning and she needed to be. It was a cut throat world and her chosen profession was competitive. Slinking about the room, she knew that she wasn't as graceful as some of the girls there, but she held her own. With a practiced hand she adjusted the wig on her head. The curls were her signature orange hue.

It started with a strange prickling feeling on the back of her head. It tickled her so lightly it was as if it weren't happening, but eerily persistent in its caress. The sensation spread down her neck and spine. Blazing through her fitted blue dress the nearly tangible touch caused her to turn her head, but there was no one there. No one had touched her however the feeling still remained in all its poignant resonance. Her kohl rimmed eyes searched her immediate surroundings, but was met with nothing but smoke.

Then she saw him.

He was leant against the wall. Folding and inconspicuous – she hadn't noticed him until then, but with his un-surreptitious stare he had caught her attention. Shamelessly – she stared back at him, but he remained as he was: Stoic and statuesque propped against the wall with his dark eyes burning into her. There wasn't anything markable that drew her to him. He didn't have overly impressive features or mannerisms. He didn't pursue her as some of her customers did with wet, open-mouthed kisses or provocative grabs. Only his eyes followed her, and they were dark and unreadable. They weren't filled with lust or insinuation. They only watched her with a strange hollow gaze that left her feeling very odd and very vulnerable.

She approached him. Drawn to him as inexplicably as a moth to a flame – she didn't understand why she felt so compelled to be near this man. Perhaps it was that he was alone and the curve of his shoulders, so broken and lost, reminded her of her lot in life. She, like the man, was very much alone and out of place. Whatever the reason was - she went to him.

She could tell now that she was closer that his eyes a strange hazel brown, and she could see that pain echoing in their cavernous depths. Though she was tall for a female he was still taller. The angles on his face were pleasant but not overwhelming and as she stood directly in front of him she could see the wariness in his expression. Or maybe the wariness was a reflection from her face. Whatever it was she extended a slender pale hand and ran it down the length of his arm. His eyes followed the hand as she discovered muscles that didn't appear to be there at first glance. Edging closer so that her breasts brushed lightly against his chest she let her other hand come up behind his head and twine into the dark blonde hair at the nape of his neck. Then, keeping her eyes in contact with his, she pulled his mouth to hers in the slightest of touches.

Neither one knew what the other one wanted but they both know where that night was going to end.

She pulled back. The brush of lips had been a promise of what was yet to come; an invitation into her world of night, and it was an invitation that he accepted. Taking his hand she led him up the stairs into the darkness with which she was all too familiar. He didn't have a beard, but the stubble of a long day scratched her skin when they kissed. The large hands that roamed her body were gentle, something that was rare in her profession, and he didn't seem to be in a hurry to get anywhere in particular. There was a distinct taste of sorrow and remorse on his tongue as though he were sorry for what he was doing to her. She didn't want his pity – so she kissed him harder.

The night ended up right where they knew it would. In a mess of tangled limbs and gasping breaths. Their skin was slick as oil against each other. No words were exchanged, no preambles or declarations, but at the peak of their pleasure she heard foreign words sliding off his tongue in broken whispers. When it was over he crumpled atop of her – breaths coming in heavy pants – as she ran her fingernails gently up and down his spine. He was a leanly built man with muscles you wouldn't imagine at first seeing him. He wasn't overly-heavy, but it was a relief to her breathing when he rolled off of her.

Unlike most men – he didn't get out of her bed the moment he had reached his ultimate satisfaction. Instead he lay there beside her on his back. His chest still gently heaving and she propped herself on her side facing him. Gently she kissed the skin on his pectoral in a soothing gesture before turning back to the other side and sliding out of bed. First she grasped the cup that sat on the table beside the bed and drank the bitter contents of vinegar and herbs. She barely tasted the bitterness anymore. Then she began to dress and he followed suit. Naturally – it took her longer to dress than he, but on his way out he dropped a few coins on the table where her cup sat.

Then he was gone.

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He was back before the end of the week, and they went through their strange silent ritual once again. Every four or five days he would come for her and she would go upstairs with him. They rarely spoke, but they didn't need to. Though she found herself wishing she understood the words that showered over her as he rode out his bliss with his eyes pressed into tight lines and his forehead creased violently. 

However one night after nearly three months of meeting like this – he didn't close his eyes. He stared right into her gaze. Each foreign word was as gasped and choking as the one before it as he tumbled into ecstasy, but this time he took her with him. Then it was still. The flats of his forearms rested of either side of her body holding him up just enough so as not to crush her. The sweat of their bodies' was obvious proof of their exertions. The orange curls of her wigs stuck to her face and her neck as did his natural dark blonde. In truth, the hair she hid underneath her vibrant wigs was much the same color as his.

It was eerily still as they seemed to barely dare to breathe so as not to break the moment they'd created. That is until she heard it. It started so quietly she felt it more than heard it. The hot drops burned into the skin of her neck and the shoulders above her trembled and quaked. This man was crying with his face buried in the crook of her neck and it frightened her.

Unsure of what to do - she wrapped her arms around him as he cried. She'd never held a weeping man and though it was unnerving she was glad to be holding this one. It wasn't a long cry, or a loud one, but it was one that had obviously been a long time coming. It was comparable to a summer storm in its quick violent execution and just as quickly as he had begun to cry he was kissing her. She could taste the salt of his tears on her lips.

A month later it was her turn to cry while they worked together at a furiously slow pace and only a week later he whispered "I love you" against her lips, neck, and hair during their coupling. Two weeks later she told him her name and three days later he told her his. Between kisses and curses they shared life stories and facts and seven months after their first encounter she didn't drink the herbs that had kept her from conceiving. The next morning they were married. She took his name and left The Pike. She left behind the orange wigs and the overly tight corsets and exactly nine months to the day of their wedding she gave birth to a son.

From the first moment she laid eyes on their child she knew that he was going to look just like his father. His eyes weren't the traditional murky, dark, baby blue of most infants but they were the haunting hazel that she had noted on the first encounter she had with her husband. Every night she sung him to sleep – watching those familiar eyes flutter closed as she held him. Her husband would listen to her sing as well and praise her voice with a kiss. Sometimes he called her his little songbird.

The baby was quiet and studious. Those eyes observed everything and she swore that he had gotten that from his father as well. They watched the world the same way that her husband had watched her the first night they'd met. They'd named their son after his father. Since he looked like him – it only seemed appropriate. It was a short, but strong name and fit him to a tee.

They named the baby Jack.

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**A/N**: Yeah. You think that you have it all figured out now, don't you? Well. You don't. As always – constructive criticism is my favorite thing in the world. My next favorite thing is just plain old praise. Reviews in general are just absolutely fabulous. The next chapter will be up in a few days. 


	2. Fumbling Towards the Unavoidable

**Disclaimer**: I do not own "Newsies" or any of the genius associated to them. Disney owns them, no infringement intended. I am not making money from this in any way, I claim no rights to the characters mentioned from the movie, but I do claim the plot and the ideas surrounding this story. Don't steal, don't sue, and I'm sure we will all be grand friends.

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A/N**: Like I promised – the next installment. There is only one more after this one. Then I should be back to updating _Loving Brooklyn_. I needed to get this idea out of the way before I could focus on LB again. I finished half of the next chapter before this idea just completely consumed me. So, if you haven't read that fiction – consider this my shameless plug. It really is good, oozing Spot!fic – and will be what I am working on after this fiction is finished. So if you like me, or you like Spot (who doesn't?)… even if you hate me and like Spot head over in that direction. It's worth it.

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Warning**: PG-13 (suggestive language, angst)

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Chapter 2: **Fumbling Towards the Unavoidable

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Her husband was a fisherman. Sometimes he was gone for days and it was lonely in their one room tenement apartment. After being used to the endless nights of men and the dizzying colors of the dresses after a few too many glasses of alcohol – it was hard to adjust to staying in that little room and caring for a littler baby. It wasn't that she didn't love the child. She did! It was just that she found herself wanting to put back on those garish orange curls and tie her corset strings as tightly as she once did. She had hated the abuses she had taken a whore, but she missed the attention. The open stares and knowledge that she was wanted, though degrading to some, was something she had grown so acclimated to it was difficult to adjust. 

She had no other skills.

Her education was so limited that she could barely read. Her seamstress work was absurd as was her cooking. Anything but the most basic of adding and subtracting was lost to her in the field of mathematics. When she was a little girl she had sold flowers, sometimes apples, on the street. That wouldn't get her anywhere now. The skills that she possessed lay in the realm of fantasy and passion. She knew how to swivel her hips, paint her face, and fake her pleasure. She knew how to lace her corset, bat her lashes, and saunter around a room. There was an artistry in her movements that spoke highly of her training to be high-dollar, but none of that would help her now. All she could do was please men – and sing.

Yes. She could sing. Her voice had never had the training of an opera starlet, and it showed, but she had a gift. The resonant tones of her voice rang true and clear in the hours she spent alone with her little boy. Every time she sang the little boy would focus his eyes on her. The chubby little neck would turn and try to find from where that sound was coming. When his smiles finally came – her singing always managed to coax a little grin out of him; if she tickled him while she sang – he would giggle.

He was a dear little child and with each passing day he looked more and more like his father. The soft dark down that had crowned his head at birth fell out and grew in thicker and blonder. He was a quick and alert baby. In his first months he often would try to stuff his whole fist into his mouth, but would cry out in frustration when he was foiled by a mouth that was just too small. She would laugh and sing to him until he smiled. When he could sit up Jack found great joy in playing with his toes. She would set him up on a ragged blanket and he would stare at his feet in utter amazement. Then, as quickly as a clumsy baby could, he would reach out a pudgy fist and grasp the foot as if to surprise it. Most times he would lose his balance and fall to his side while still holding tightly to his toes, but eventually he learned to stay upright.

He was six months old when he was first able to crawl, and then only a few paces at a time. She wasn't sure when the appropriate time was for this to happen, but an older woman in their tenement told her that this was about the correct time for mobility to increase. As Jack's mobility increased so did her desire to get out of the tiny apartment. For the first few months she'd busied herself at scrubbing every teeny-tiny crack of the apartment. Though it was only one room it has been absolutely filthy. Then with one of her dresses from The Pike she had created makeshift curtains of sorts for their one window. The garish, faded, purple satin looked odd in the otherwise bleak apartment, but it was her best attempts at making the place feel like a home.

One day warm spring day she took a walk while holding Jack tightly to her chest. The previous months had been too cold for such an outing, but now as the warmer weather arrived she was grateful for the opportunity for fresh air and open surroundings. She walked down the streets with her baby in her arms. As always her little Jack was busy taking in his environment. His hazel eyes scanned the streets for something new and different. It felt wonderful to get out of that little box of an apartment and stretch her legs. Even though the streets were busy with people and merchants she enjoyed the hubbub. It was a refreshing change from the quiet room that she called home.

As she walked along the sidewalk, watching for pickpockets and unsavory characters, she noted a sign upon the door of an establishment only a few blocks from her tenement. It read of the resident vaudeville and melodrama performing troupe which was holding auditions in that very building. The bright colors and swirling letters on the poster were intoxicatingly reminiscent of the overall feel of The Pike. Shifting Jack from on arm to the other she continued to the read the advertisement. It took her a greater amount of time then most to pick out the words and comprehend them, but once she did she understood their desire for singers. In the same moment that her hopes rose to the skies – Jack began to whimper. He was hungry and she knew that she needed to return home.

For the next week all she could think of was that poster and its bright colors and glittering promises.

The truth was that even though she had hated her live in The Pike and was thankful for every day she spent out of that terrible hell hole – she harbored a desire so secret that even she didn't know that she had it.

She craved the attention and exhilaration of being desired, and she wanted to go back to that life of performing. If it hadn't been for the chubby cheeked cherub that now nursed from her breast she would have auditions in a heartbeat. The time at The Pike had reduced her timidity of performing considerably, but as she looked down at the face of the content infant she knew her place. It was here with her child and her husband.

Though it never did any harm to think about it – did it?

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Her husband came home whenever he could. Working on a fishing boat had its perks as they often had fresh fish for dinner. She'd become proficient enough in cooking them and he was obviously proficient enough in catching them. They were lucky that they never went hungry. Though, it could be said without the slightest reservation that, they did get quite bored with fish. 

In their first few months of marriage she had learned that the language he spoke over her in his passion was Gaelic. She learned that he had moved over from Europe after his first wife had died as had his child from what the doctors had called "consumption" and, like her, had no other family to speak of. She learned that he had a temper but was not violent. She learned that he was protective of her but he was far more proud. She learned that he favored her natural hair to the orange curled wigs she had worn at The Pike and he preferred her face not painted like a clown. She learned that her son wasn't the only one who appreciated her voice.

Often times she caught him staring at her as she sang to their child and it brought a flush to her cheeks. Blushing was not something that had occurred to her too regularly before this man and his piercing stare had come into her life. Every night he was home when she sang their child to sleep he would sit in a chair at their table and just watch her. It was unnerving as it was flattering. It was in those moments that she remembered what it was like to perform and to be desired. It was in those moments that she felt like she was a whore – and she liked it.

Perhaps it was the dysfunctional family she had when she was a girl that made her so wanting of attention and praise. Perhaps it was the conditioning that she went through at The Pike. Perhaps it was the intense desire she had to please her husband. Perhaps it was simply her nature. Whatever it was she knew that these feelings, no matter how much they disgusted her, truly were appealing. Even when he husband took her in his arms she returned to the ways she knew the best and in the back of her mind an idea always tickled.

Would this always be enough?

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They'd been married for nearly two years. Ever since the birth of young Jack she had taken to drinking the vinegar and herbs so she wouldn't conceive unexpectedly. She'd heard stories of women having children too close together and the complications that came. If it wasn't at the birth then it was with the raising of the children in the crowded New York tenements afterwards. She never told her husband of this though she knew he probably expected it. Her husband was quiet, but he wasn't dumb. 

It wasn't that she didn't want more children. She adored her child, but something held her back. The tiniest voice in the back of her head whispered to her menacingly that this wasn't where she belonged. Dreams for far ago echoed in her mind. That poster taunting her still even though auditions were long over and every time she took a walk with her son she found herself walking past that theatre. Sometimes she even ventured into the vicinity of The Pike. Even though she knew the abuses that took place inside of those walls part of her wanted to go back. Was she made for the life she was leading? Then she would look at Jack, her constant companion, and she would see his father reflected through him and she pressed the thoughts away from her mind. It didn't matter if she were made for this life – it was the one she had chosen.

The one room apartment seemed to grow smaller as young Jack grew bigger. The purple satin curtains had been replaced with more practical fabric since their earlier days and there was a little more furniture. Out of necessity, little Jack had his own small cot now instead of a basket filled with a pillow and rags. He was a year and a half and walked everywhere by himself. The words that he spoke were total gibberish, but she found it inescapably endearing whenever he managed to associate her with the word "mama". His father grew increasingly proud of him everyday and she couldn't help but feel the tiniest twinge of guilt whenever he mentioned "giving young Jack brothers and sisters".

That twinge of guilt grew to an overwhelming tidal wave a week later when she received news that he husband had drowned in an accident. There wouldn't be a funeral because is body hadn't been recovered and she couldn't think of a single person who she would invite. They really knew no one in the city besides work partners, and those who had worked with her husband would be out on the ship in the next few days once more. Those she had worked with… she wouldn't invite them. No, a ceremony would be a pointless gesture that was too expensive to afford.

Her whole world spun out from underneath her feet but she could not afford the luxury of grief. Mourning was for the rich who could spends days, weeks, or even months pining away without missing a meal. This was not the case for her. She allowed herself one half hour for tears but that was all she could afford. Even as she grieved she took care of Jack who was quite puzzled by the tears on her cheeks. The toddler gave awkward, sloppy kisses to her tear stained cheeks – imitating the way she comforted him when he cried. It healed and broke her heart at the same time. She was now a widow and though she had provided for herself before she had never had to provide for herself as well as for a child.

Was she going to be able to?

The little voice that had lived in the back of her head for so long was now speaking louder than it had previously. Idea after idea pounded through her mind and she knew that he options were limited. Since Jack had been born she had lost the weight she had gained in pregnancy and returned to her thin figure. The Pike would take her back if she wanted them too. After all she was not quite twenty and still had several years left as a prostitute if need be. Though the idea appealed there was that small voice in the back of her head again reminding her of that poster at the theatre company.

She hadn't seen any advertisement for another audition since that first day, but she knew that in her current state she didn't have any time for hesitancy or shyness. The fact was that her life _did_ depend on her finding a job and so did her son's. So even though her heart felt pulverized and every move was heavy and hard – she performed her duty. She laced her corset as tightly as she could manage and painted her face a bit with the little bit of cosmetics she had remaining from her time at The Pike. It wasn't anything impressive, but enough to hide the fact she had been crying. Then before she could lose her courage she bundled up Jack and herself and set into the chilly fall day.

There was an advertisement for their newest show on the wall by the door. She would have paused to read it but she knew that if she did she would lose the courage she needed to go inside. So she pressed onward to the door. It was locked and her heart initially sank and her courage waned, but instead of giving up she looked at the toddler who held onto her fingers by her side. She was doing this for him and for the father he had unknowingly lost. Determination marking her stride she went into the alley along side the building. At The Pike she had always entered from the back as had all of the other whores – so perhaps _these_ performers entered in the same way. If the unlocked door she found was any indication – apparently they did.

Swallowing heavily she went inside and kept Jack close. Picking him up she rested him on her hip as she let her eyes adjust to the darkness. This was the kind of ill lit surrounding that was familiar to The Pike and she felt a connection immediately. The confident determination that had moved her feet outside was now replaced by a quiet shuffling of feet. She could hear people talking and laughing and as her eyes adjusted to the dusky interior she could see what seemed to be racks of costumes and tables littered with smaller knickknacks. Large cut outs from wood took the shape of flat trees and bushes. Thick cables and oversized pulleys were everywhere. This had to be their backstage area.

Biting back the nerves that were raising her stomach she didn't allow herself the choice of turning around and leaving before anyone knew that she was there. Instead she took a few more steps in an attempt to identify from where the voices were coming. In only ten steps she was encountered by a man who didn't seem overly happy that she was in the theater. Quickly she explained her story of wishing to perform on stage to her seeing the poster months ago and how she was finally asking about the position. It spilled from her messily in an overwhelming wave even though she excluded the fact that he husband had just died that day.

That exclusion was partially from her still adjusting to the idea and also from her not wanting this job out of pity. She wanted to earn this job. She wanted to prove to herself that people still wanted – desired her. She wanted to prove that this was _her _dream and no one else's. All the while Jack sat on her hip and stared at the new man in front of them as stoically as the man who looked back at his mother.

The man was tall and burly with a greased black handlebar moustache and exaggerated features. He stood every inch of six feet five inches and possessed shoulders which looked like they wouldn't fit through a doorway. In the dim light of the backstage area his age was hard to make out, but if his slightly receding hairline was any clue he, assumedly, was near thirty.

"We have no room." Was his burly reply at the end of her labored confessional.

"What do you mean we have no room?" A shrill voice came from the shadows before she could protest for herself and a woman as small as the man was big emerged.

"We have no room." He repeated as he turned to the voice that now stood beside him. The small woman's arms were akimbo and she looked up at him. Because the man was so tall – the small woman had to crane her small neck back to gaze up in his face.

"Have you at least heard her sing?" the woman shot back to his short reply and the man shook his head. "We always need singers! We must hear her sing before we make any decisions." She deduced reasonably and grasped her by the arm. "Come with me." The small woman ordered and pulled her and Jack along with her in the direction of a bright light.

So with Jack on her hip she went followed the small woman out into the light. The light happened to be the stage where there were other men and women standing about. Some were in a state of undress. Men were clothed only to the waist and women only in their shift and corset while others were in what appeared to be their costumes. A few wore wigs and rouge on the stage while others climbed above on ladders to adjust mirrors that had been put up to reflect the light from the candles away from the audience. Looking at the bright swirling skits and colorful curled wigs she knew she had found the place she belonged, and now was her time to prove it.

The small woman obviously had a lot of sway in the running of the operation and it was apparent in the way that the people on stage and above it paid attention when she entered. Initially she blinked in the bright lights. Their shine was a sharp contrast from the dimness. Jack made a funny little noise of what could have been described as distaste and she hummed in his ear comfortingly. All eyes were on her and she felt very much the intruder. Nevertheless she held her head high and when she was asked to sing – she did so with gusto. Jack laughed and clapped. He still loved his mother's voice.

The rest of that encounter was a blur. The small woman and the large man talked in quick hushed tones in a language she didn't understand while she stood awkwardly shifting Jack from one hip to the other. Then the large man in a gruff voice asked if the child she held was hers and she froze for an instant. She may not have been educated, but she wasn't dumb. She knew why he was asking her this.

This was a decision between a job and her child.

It was as though someone had punched her in the stomach. Without this job she knew that she would be locked up in a factory or go back to The Pike. She'd rather die than be in a factory and even if she did go there – who would look after Jack? She didn't have anyone that would and even if she did she wouldn't be able to pay them. This job was what was supposed to support her and Jack, but apparently she couldn't have them both. Looking at the baby in her arms – he looked back at her with those hazel eyes that looked so much like his father and her heart absolutely disintegrated.

She wanted to keep him and watch him grow up. She was looking for a job so that she could buy him food, clothing, and possibly send him to school. If she said yes to this job she wouldn't be able to keep him and give him more a chance than she had. Everything within her wanted more for him than she had when she had grown, but she knew that if she took a job at The Pike he would never be able to exceed the poverty stricken level he had been born into. The same was with a factory. She couldn't give her son the life she wanted him to have.

If she lost this opportunity she would lose the only chance she had to better her life and possibly even his. She'd heard of couples who were slightly better off that adopted babies because they couldn't have their own. A friend at The Pike had set up these sorts of arrangements for a few of the other girls who hadn't taken their medicine and gotten pregnant. They couldn't survive with a baby and now she knew that neither could she. She could be selfish and keep her child and watch them both slowly starve and freeze to death in the upcoming winter – or she could give him up with the hope that he would have all of the opportunities that she never had.

She looked at the strange couple in front of her; the woman being so small and the man being so large. Her mind was so set in her decision that even when she heard Jack begin to prattle softly in her ear she was able to say what she needed to say. Even though, it broke her into pieces to small to be imagined.

"No. He's not mine. I take care of him while his mother goes to the factory." She spoke robotically and then it was done.

They gave her the job and told her that she would be able to live with the troupe in the theatre but the child could not be with her. The workings of the theatre were too dangerous to have a toddler stumbling about. Someone else would have to care for it. She thanked them both and told them she had to settle a few things before she could move in but that she would be there by the end of the week; and she was.

After she left the theatre she went to The Pike and sought out her friend (knowing that she'd lose her courage if she waited another moment). The adoption went much more quickly than she expected. She never met the couple; she didn't go when they took Jack to them; she didn't ask what their names were or where they lived. She just sang to Jack one last time as her friend took him from her arms and carried him away screaming to go and meet his new family.

She didn't cry.

She didn't have time.

Her child cried, however. He cried for months after he switched households. Eventually however, as all children do, Jack forgot. He forgot the songs that his mother had sung to him when he was going to sleep. He forgot the mother who had given him up for what she believed to be his benefit. He forgot that his name was Jack and that small apartment that had been his home for nearly the first two years of his life. He forgot to cry because he forgot to miss the first mother he ever had.

The woman he would learn to call "mother" couldn't sing. The man he would learn to call "father" was a manager at a factory with the last name of Sullivan. They lived comfortably in an apartment which was small, but large compared to his old one. They never went to the theatre or to any such thing and when he was old enough Jack went to a small primer school for the neighborhood children privileged enough not to have to work. They didn't call him Jack, however, because that was not his named any longer.

The ones he called parents as well as the ones he called friends addressed him as Francis Sullivan.

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A/N**: Perhaps this makes a bit more sense now – but it isn't over yet. There is one last part that I am still writing. Any guesses what could happen? I'd be really surprised if someone got it (not because you're dumb, but because I think I have a really nice twist coming up)! At the risk of sounding desperate: PLEASE REVIEW! Constructive criticism will be appreciated, blatant praise will go straight to my head, and flames will be ignored. smiles really big


	3. Life Goes Full Circle

**Disclaimer**: I do not own "Newsies" or any of the genius associated to them. Disney owns them, no infringement intended. I am not making money from this in any way, I claim no rights to the characters mentioned from the movie, but I do claim the plot and the ideas surrounding this story. Don't steal, don't sue, and I'm sure we will all be grand friends.

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**A/N**: Well – this is it. Sorry it took so long. I now am out of school for the summer and have one week before I start teaching summer camps for little kids. Yipes! Crazy I know! I really don't have much of a summer, but I hope to have a lot of time to write some things that I really want to get done (i.e. Author's cut of _Frostbitten_ and finishing _Loving Brooklyn_.) Anyway, please enjoy this last installment of this fiction.

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**Warning**: PG (angst)

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**Chapter 3: **Life Goes Full Circle

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There wasn't a single day that went past that she didn't think about them. While she never spoke of them – she couldn't shake their memory and she didn't want to. In the quiet moments of the theatre she would shut her eyes and just picture the husband and child she were no longer a part of her life. It was in those moments she would sigh. Only those moments, however; she didn't have any other time for them.

The other moments were far too full with other things to allow her to be caught up in her past. She'd learned how to forget one past full of a battered childhood and hunger. She'd learned to forget the abuses she'd taken at The Pike. Now she had to learn how to forget another much different from the first. She had to forget a life of love and affection. There wasn't any other choice. Thus she did it the only way she knew how: by becoming someone else.

The theatre made it easy. First she was only understudy to roles – learning the parts of those who had been in the company longer. It was an unexalted position, but the companions she made among the performers made for good times. Their strange little community was frowned upon by the upper classes. There was no respect for the unorthodox practices they shared in living together and the immodesties suffered by the performers. It was true that the lives they lead were immoral on many standards of society, but she loved it.

There was a freedom in the company that she hadn't remembered in any other path. She could sleep with a man from the company on a drunken night and have no one think the less of her. Promiscuity was rampant, but wasn't overly discouraged. It was empowering, but she never forgot about the husband she'd lost or the little boy who was growing up as someone else's. She never spoke of them and no one ever asked. It was an unspoken rule that no one asked about the past of another company member. As far as they were concerned she had never existed before she walked in the doorway.

And in a way – she hadn't.

* * *

Members of the company seemed to come and go on the weekly. Some came back, others left for good, but she stayed just as she was. Though she grew older – the fake orange curls on her head never faded and the bright satins and taffetas she wore stayed as brilliant as her voice. She'd come into favor with the owners. That strange small woman and the large burly man who had ushered into this world she had dreamed of took a liking to her in the third or fourth year of her membership.

She was one of the only ones that stayed longer than a year.

This made it little surprise that after ten years of being a member in the company they made her a partner of sorts. It was unofficial, but it was understood all the same. She knew more about the running of the theater than even they did at times. Somewhere along the line she had developed a keen eye for the business and was the highest paying attraction the theatre offered. The show she performed was popular songs under a stage guise. It was a name she had concocted from the name her husband had called her when she sang.

If she was his songbird – then she was the public's meadowlark.

The crowds adored her as did her employers. Yet in the midst of the swirling skirts, painted faces, tightly laced corsets, wigs, praise, cat calls, and flaunting on stage there were always the moments where she would sit and remember. Though the moments were brief – they were poignant. No matter of success could outweigh what she had left behind and what she had lost.

She knew it wasn't a mistake to love that man and bear his child. It wasn't a mistake to give up her life at The Pike or to give up her little Jack. There was no way that she could have provided for her son and herself. By sacrificing him to a well established family she had secured him a life she never could have given him. It was in those quiet moments though that she always wondered how it could have been different for them.

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It was twelve years after the day she walked into the theatre that the small woman who ran it passed away. The death was sudden, unexpected, and hit the large man (as well as the company) quite hard. Doctors chalked it up to an attack of the heart, but it didn't matter how she had died to the large man. In a matter of a few weeks he had taken the money that he considered his from the establishment and left the company to the running of his number one attraction.

Thus the meadowlark of the stage became the soul proprietor of the theatre.

The events were a whirlwind but it was the custom of the theatre to be as such. New acts came and went every week it seemed and the vaudeville and melodrama changed just as frequently. She, however, remained the same. The songs she sang might be different, the dresses she donned a different color, but the orange curled wigs were always in place. Her title didn't change as much as it evolved. There was little catchy about the name of meadowlark, and in show business it was all about catching the attention of the public. Thus she developed a character to further her name and add a touch of the exotic. She'd learned of men's lust for the foreign and unknown in her time in The Pike and here she used it to her advantage.

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After a few months – everything was running smoothly. Shows were selling, the company members were content, and she was living her dream to the best of her ability. A successful woman though looked down upon by high society, who sang on stage and was adored by men. She got her attention to be sure and she reveled in it. The warmth from the lights faded, however, and always left her wanting more.

It was nearing the thirteenth anniversary of her arrival at the theatre and she was cleaning out some of the backstage clutter that seemed to grow on its own. Flat board sets and oversized props abounded without organization. The only semblance of order was that the props and sets in use for the melodrama were towards the front near the stage. Dust floated in lamp light as she picked through different racks of costumes. There were wigs of all different colors and styles. She lingered over each of her signature orange curls, which she wasn't wearing now, but donned carefully for every performance. There were so many and it seemed that a memory was tied to each. The rest of the company were either out on stage practicing, out on the town, or sleeping in the living quarters. No one was there to disturb her as she lost herself in the thoughts and memories of the theatre.

No one until the backstage door burst open and shut just as rapidly.

"Who is it?" She demanded quickly as she turned around to locate the person.

It wasn't strange to have people come in and out of the building – but it was strange to have a person enter in that fashion. Stranger still was that she didn't see anyone. Could it have been a dramatic exit? No, she hadn't heard anyone go to the door. Someone had come in. Lamp in hand she walked over towards the entrance.

"Who's there?" She questioned. Her steps weren't overly-confident and her heart was beating quickly.

Noise from the melodrama's rehearsal wafting through the air and she wished that there were uncovered windows or some of the electric bulbs backstage. It would be easier than dealing with the lamp, but she pressed on. She didn't see anyone. In the darkness of the cramped backstage area she continued her search. Her breathing was shallow and it wasn't entirely due to the corset she wore. All of her senses were on edge and itched with anticipation. For an instant she thought she was going insane, but then there was a loud crash. Her eyes went instantly to the noise.

Light from the lamp illuminated a dark corner where a prop had fallen off of a table and the intruder stood beside it. They made a quick move to flee but she effectively blocked their path and grabbed their arm. The arm was small, but they were stronger than she. Their superior strength led to their breaking free but not before she had called out for help. The intruder had managed to escape from her – but they couldn't escape the theatre members that swarmed in from rehearsal.

In moments the intruder was detained and brought in front of her by two men of the company. It was a boy who couldn't be older than fifteen and his face stared down at the floor. The clothes he wore were once nice but now were dirty and torn. Dark blonde hair hung with his head, greasy and trenched from fingers running through it. He was still struggling against the holds on his arms but he didn't say a word. There were murmurs and words going through the crowd at the capture of the strange boy. Occasionally they had vagabonds wander in from the street with no purpose but it had been quite awhile since the last.

"What are you doing here?" she asked. It was a standard question for anyone who walked through that door. You never knew when a new talent would be walking through the door. The boy didn't respond, though his struggling had ceased. "What are you doing here?" She repeated.

"Just waiting for some trouble outside to go away," was the mumbled reply.

Then he lifted his head and shook back the hair that had fallen over his face. In the dim gleam of the lamp light she could make out his appearance. Lean angles showed a face of a boy who had already become a young man. A firm mouth, long nose, and high cheek bones all framed the two eyes which shone with the lamp's light. Two eyes which caused the heart in her chest to beat faster than it had ever beaten before. Her mouth went dry and it felt like someone had punched her in the gut. Two piercing hazel eyes stared back at her. Two haunting hazel eyes which she hadn't seen in thirteen years; if she hadn't known better she would have sworn her husband had come back from the dead. However she did know better. She knew people didn't come back from the dead, and she did know that children grew. Children grew into people wlike them even as an infant.

"I didn't take anything." The boy said defensively. "Honest. Just let me go and I'll leave." He bargained and she felt a catch grow in her throat. His voice even sounded like her husbands.

The two men who held him looked to her for orders and she nodded her head. With that they released him and the boy made haste for the door. This time it was she that grabbed his arm. He froze.

"It might not be safe to go out yet." She reasoned. "Stay here a bit longer and talk with me." She would have been stupid if she hadn't noted the wary look that entered his hazel eyes at her request, but he did so. Whether it was because he wanted to talk to her or because he feared for his own safety – she'd never know. She had a sneaking suspicion, however, that it was the latter.

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The company went back to rehearsing and she took the boy up the stairs to what was an office of sorts. It was where she kept all of the paper work for the theatre and its expenses. The room also doubled as a sort of dressing room for her and storage space for various things. It was in that room she learned about the boy.

The longer he stayed and spoke to her the more and more certain she became. From the initial gut reaction to the sight of him to the instants she spoke with him now – she only grew more certain. This boy was undoubtedly her child. All of the day dreams, all of the imaginations, all of the wonderings and worrying about her child were now being fulfilled. There was no way to certify the validity of her feelings beside the intensely maternal sensation boiling inside. She couldn't justify or rationalize any of it beyond the fact that she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was her boy.

His name was Francis Sullivan and held the age of fifteen years. His mother was dead from small pox two years ago and his father was in prison for extortion. This left him the custody of the state and because of his father's criminal nature they had put him under the care of a warden for a boy's rehabilitation facility called The Refuge. She had heard of the place and it sent a shiver down her spine.

"So I ran from him. I'm not going back." He spoke defiantly now. He was relaxed now that he knew for sure she meant him not harm at all.

"Where are you staying?" She inquired. She never wanted to lose him again and she intended to know where he was living.

"No where." He answered sullenly and the wheels in her head automatically began turning.

"If you aren't going back to The Refuge then we need to turn you into someone who they aren't looking for. You can't be Francis Sullivan anymore." She stood and he looked at her curiously. There was a spark in those hazel eyes she recognized even from when he was an infant.

"If I'm not going to be me, then who am I going to be?" He stood as well and she looked at him with a bright smile. He'd grown tall. Though he was gangly now she knew he would fill out. He would look just like his father in only a few years.

"Don't worry. I have just the thing."

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She did indeed have just the thing. It was an old costume for a previous production that she had stored in that very room. The dark trousers and light blue shirt were too big for him, but she knew he would grow. The stripped vest was just the touch it needed though it too hung loosely on his bean pole of a frame. A red bandana tied around his neck and tucked into his collar. The final touch was a faded black cowboy hat which rested upon his head in a truly crowning fashion. The full length mirror distorted him slightly, but he was able to capture the essence of his appearance and smiled crookedly at the reflection.

When he donned the outfit a certain cocky confidence came about him. He'd put on the role of a character as easily as he had changed his clothes and she smiled. While the boy might have looked like his father he had captured his mother's flair for the dramatics. He experimented with the hat. Tipping the hat all sorts of angles and positions he finally pushed it off his head to fall and rest on his back.

"I look like a real cowboy." He mused and she laughed. Her heart swelled with inexplicable pride.

"Maybe you are one." She returned coyly and he looked back at her with a smile. "But now that you look a different part – you have to have a different name. If they're looking for Francis Sullivan you don't want that name to follow you." She informed from experience. After all – she was a woman with three pasts and three different names to go with them. Purging yourself of your former title was all part of the transformation.

"I haven't ever had another name." This dampened his smile momentarily with a puckering of his brow.

He looked back in the mirror and adjusted his vest as she wanted to tell him everything about how he had a different name. She wanted to tell him that she was his mother and that Francis Sullivan was the real character he was impersonating. Everything within her wanted to confess the entire story of how she'd met his father as a whore, fallen in love, and born him into their marriage. She wanted to tell him that she had wanted to keep him, but life had made her make other choices. There were no words that came, however. No words of how much she loved him or how she desperately wanted to keep him. Nothing was said of how she thought of him every day and prayed for his safety every night. This was partially from fear but also partially because it sounded crazy even to her. If she could barely believe it – how could he?

"Jack." The name was barely a whisper from her lips and he looked at her questioningly. "Jack." She repeated in a stronger tone. "Jack Kelly will be your name now." She took a few steps over to stand beside him in the mirror as she put the hat up on his head. "Jack Kelly – cowboy of New York." She smiled winningly and he looked at himself once again.

"Jack Kelly?" He spoke in a question as if it sounded familiar to him somehow. "Jack Kelly." He stated this time with approval. The name which had been his so many years ago rang in the room. "I like that." He admitted and her heart soared.

She may never tell him that he was hers, but at least he had the name which had always been his in her heart. The name his father had worn and she had taken proudly was now pinned to him where it belonged. She was broken from her reverie by a question that shook her almost as much as his arrival had.

"I'm Jack Kelly, but who are you?" He asked and her heart broke in a way she hadn't expected it to with such a simple phrase.

He didn't know her. She had carried him inside of her body and yet he did not know her. It was a shattering moment to realize that in his reality she didn't truly exist. His mother was the one that had abandoned him because of death not because of a dismal choice. In that moment she knew that she could tell him the truth of who she was. He'd given her a chance that couldn't have been better written in a script, and she wanted to badly. However – she didn't. She hid as she had always hidden. Before she had hidden behind makeup, wigs, costumes, and fake smiles. This time, however, she hid simply with her words. She hid by introducing herself in a way that was true but false in the same. With a smile that came easily only because of years of practice – she looked up at the boy now turning man and said:

"You can call me Medda."

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**A/N**: Ah snaps. Did you see that one coming? Did you, did you, did you? Review please. Tell me if I'm really stupid and this is the worst idea ever, but I love it. Medda being Jack's mom… come on. You have to admit that is cool. Okay. So maybe you don't, but I'm still begging for reviews. Reviews are like rain to my writing drought. 


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